Finance. Boost your financial know-how.

In this self-paced online course, you will learn financial modelling best practice in detail – learning how to confidently construct robust and transparent financial models that can be easily used and understood by others.

This course provides an introduction to the disciplines and techniques underpinning the construction of financial models that are transparent and easy to use. The course is structured around tried-and-tested best practice techniques that are the distillation of the lessons learned (often the hard way) over many years working as a professional financial modeller. It is taught in an engaging manner, making use of our real “war stories” and practical exercises, including a case study embedded throughout.

If you are about to embark on a career that requires building financial models, or you are already doing such work but have never been shown the ropes, then this is the course for you.

This course is a more detailed compilation of our one day, face-to-face, Financial Modelling Best Practice Course and our one day, face-to-face, Financial Modelling: Integrated Financial Statements Course. This 60-hour course is much more comprehensive and learning is self-managed through an online Learning Management System (Canvas).

High school students and teachers are eligible to receive a 35% discount on enrolments to this course. Apply now.

Aims

This aim of this course is to provide a systematic and comprehensive overview of best practice financial modelling, providing you with the knowledge and confidence to construct professional financial models.

Outcomes

By the end of this course, you should be able to:

• review and critique financial models against best-practice principles
• design and construct financial models that adhere to best-practice principles
• analyse and break down complex problems into simple conceptual models
• evaluate and apply pertinent spreadsheeting analysis techniques to solve problems
• describe the value and use of financial models to understand the current financial situation and analyse the potential future performance of a business
• communicate confidently and effectively within a business, using the tools and techniques of financial modelling.

Content

Financial modelling foundations

In this first topic, we will tackle the foundational concepts of financial modelling and learn everything covered in our one-day best practice financial modelling course. We will consider why we build models, who we build them for, and how to go about doing it.

We will go through an Excel 101 introduction to the functions and formulas available in Microsoft Excel, and you will also be introduced to the problem solving framework that professional financial modellers employ when attempting to convert complex business concepts into simple financial models.

Revenue and expenditure

In this topic, you will learn how to build bottom-up forecasts of the key drivers of a business, including breaking out costs into fixed, variable and semi-variable components. You will learn how to apply growth factors to reflect indexation and escalation, how to generate a capital expenditure program, how to reflect depreciation dynamically, and how to model corporate tax.

Integrated financial statements

In this topic, you will be introduced to the three financial statements that underpin the essence of a financial model (the income statement, balance sheet and cash flow statement). You will understand the importance of integrating these three statements in your models, how to use control accounts for building up the balance sheet, and how to use waterfall methods for constructing the income statement and cash flow statement.

Valuation

In this topic, you will learn about the concept of the time value of money and how this underpins the techniques used to value a business. You will apply these concepts to calculate net present values, internal rates of return and other financial ratios that are pertinent to understanding the financial state of a business. You will also learn the pitfalls underpinning the inbuilt Excel functions for NPV and IRR, and how to best address them.

Quality control

This final topic addresses some of the key quality control techniques that separate the good financial modellers from the great ones. You will learn the importance of embedding checks and alerts into your financial models, the best way to handle errors, the value of visual communication, the black list of techniques to avoid, and the various risks that you must manage as a professional financial modeller.

Intended audience

The course is designed to be suitable for those interested in going to, or already at, University; already working and using Excel, career pivots, or anyone using Microsoft Excel to build models or solve problems. Typical roles that require these skills include:

• Anyone studying or intending to study accounting, commerce, engineering, actuarial studies
• Investment bankers
• Financial analysts
• Commercial analysts
• Management consultants

This course builds skills you can apply straight away in a real-world business setting. Both your productivity and workplace confidence will be enhanced.

Please note it is a non-award course and does not contribute to a qualification under the AQF Qualifications.

Prerequisites

There are no prerequisites for attending this course. It will be assumed that you have at least opened Microsoft Excel and performed some basic tasks with it. We find that those participants who need to use Excel for their work, but have never been properly “shown the ropes”, get the most value out of this course as they have many light bulb moments.

Delivery style

You will have 120 days to complete the course (from the date of enrolment) at your own pace. It takes approximately 60 hours to complete, and learning is self-managed through an online Learning Management System (Canvas).

You will work through course materials at your own pace online. Delivery involves a mixture of:

• videos introducing each concept
• activities to reinforce the concepts learned
• open discussion of the concepts on the classroom forums
• practical problem solving through designing logic and converting it into Excel formulas, predominantly via the case study (videos provide step-by-step guidance on the construction of the case study model).

At all stages, you will have access to the facilitators who can answer any questions and help troubleshoot with any elements of the content they may be struggling with.

Materials

You will gain access to all exercises and teaching materials covered in the sessions. In addition to the videos, the activities and case study will provide a reference that you can look back on when embarking on solving your own problems with financial models (be it at work or elsewhere).

Additional information

You will need your own device with Microsoft Excel installed (Windows or Mac). A strong internet connection is also advised as the vast majority of the content is streamed as videos.

This course is managed through a Learning Management System (Canvas). Once enrolled, you will be provided with login details. All work and emails submitted through Canvas will receive a reply within 24 business hours.

This course is non-award and does not provide any official certification. Once all modules are completed, you will be issued a Statement of Completion.

Recommended reading

Benninga, S 2014, Financial Modeling (4th Edition), The MIT Press, Cambridge.

Robertson, D 2013, See-Through Modelling, Harriman House, Great Britain.